Robert Fine, Engineer – Reviews and Commentaries

Los Admiradores – Robert Fine Knocked This One Out of the Park

More Hot Stamper Pressings of Easy Listening Albums

More Recordings by Robert Fine

First things first: one of the main bongo players is none other than Ray Barretto himself. You jazz guys out there will know exactly who that is, a man whose reputation for brilliant rhythmic contributions to some of the greatest classic jazz albums of the ’60s is beyond dispute. One listen to Midnight Blue will do the trick. The man had a gift. And he is here joined by two other top players.

And of course the guitarist has to be the incomparable Tony Mottola, the man behind one of our favorite jazz guitar records of all time: Warm, Wild and Wonderful.

Soundfield, Timbre and Dynamics

The spaciousness of the studio is reproduced with uncanny fidelity, with both huge depth and width, but there is another dimension that this record is operating in that Bang, Baa-room and Harp, just to take one example, does not — the instruments are capable of jumping out of your speakers, seemingly right into your listening room.

The effect is astonishing. I have never heard these instruments sound more real than they do here. The timbre is perfection. The dynamics are startling.

Add to those clearly unattenuated dynamics, high and low frequencies that are also not attenuated, and microphones capable of deadly accuracy, and you have yourself a recording of virtually unparalleled fidelity. We’ve played these kinds of records by the score but I have rarely heard one that can do what this one is doing.

No Reverb? Say What?

In discussing Robert Fine’s approach to this recording in the lengthy liner notes ( a full two pages worth!), the author notes that Fine does not tolerate added reverb or echo of any kind. He feels it distorts and degrades the clarity and timbral accuracy of the instruments.

The crazy thing is, this album is swimming in reverberation. The space is enormous, the presentation as three-dimensional as any you have ever heard, with clearly audible reflections bouncing off the walls of the studio deep into the soundstage.

If the notes are to be believed, it’s all REAL. And I have no trouble taking Fine at his word. As the engineer behind some of the greatest orchestral recordings in the history of the world for Mercury, his bona fides are fully in order.

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The Nutcracker – Side to Side Notes Included

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky

Our favorite combination of performance and sound can be found on the Decca recording of the work from 1959 performed by Ansermet and the Suisse Romande.

This review was written for our last (and probably final) shootout for the Dorati from about ten years ago. We no longer buy these Mercury pressings because the vinyl tends to be too noisy for most audiophiles. I have a high tolerance for noise, but most of our customers do not.

Hot Stamper pressings of Mercury classical and orchestral recordings can be found here.

Click on the link to see more records for which we’ve detailed the strengths and weaknesses of a specific shootout copy.

Our Review from from the 2010s

This London Symphony recording is without a doubt THE BEST SOUNDING Nutcracker we have ever played here at Better Records, and that includes not only the full ballet but the suites and excerpts as well. The sound in a word is GLORIOUS. This copy, with 8 1/2 pluses total for the four sides, has DEMO DISC quality sound on three out of four sides. We shot out nine original maroon label copies (and one oval label Philips pressing) so we had our work cut out for us when it came to this masterwork of Tchaikovsky’s. It was an absolute JOY to hear his sublime orchestration recorded so faithfully and naturally by the Mercury team, using 35MM film no less. 

A top performance with top quality sound. Let’s get right to each of the four sides.

Side One

A TRIPLE PLUS sound, the best in show. The stage is huge and 3-D, there’s tons of energy, the string texture — always a worry with Mercury — is excellent as well, and the sound of the orchestra is full-bodied and solid.

The sound of the strings is what put this side over the top. When have you ever heard Mercury strings sound so rich and tubey-magical as they do here? We were gobsmacked at the lushness of the string tone, something you hear often wiht Golden Age recordings on Decca and RCA but almost never on Mercury.

Side Two

A+ to A++, the weakest side here. Some smear to the strings and a bit too much of that old school tubey-magical overly smooth sound.

Side Three

At A++ this was another wonderful side, with especially full-bodied, solid horns. The strings got a little ragged when playing in the loudest passages, so we took off a plus. Otherwise this side is killer and getting it right from top to bottom.

Side Four

A little smear but so rich and tubey magical, this one had to earn at least two pluses for sound, A++. The sound is wall to wall and so sweet. With a little more pluck to the harp and bite to the strings this one would have been White Hot.

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What to Listen For on Ancient Dances and Airs

More of the music of Ottorino Respighi (1879-1936)

Hot Stamper Mercury Pressings Available Now

Both sides of this TAS List early Colorback RFR copy have SUPER Hot Stamper sound, so much richer and sweeter and less strident than the typical copy you might find.

I must admit the Mercury approach to sound has not worn as well as I might have hoped. When it comes to the Big Three from the Golden Age, these days we prefer London, followed by RCA, then Mercury.

[UPDATE: In 2024 I would not agree with the above statement. Many Mercury pressings are amazing now that we can reproduce them with greater fidelity.]

Of course the music is wonderful, with Respighi looking back and paying homage to the music and the musical structures of the past. This is no Pines of Rome. 

Side One

A++ Superb Living Presence sound. Listen especially to how textured and natural the cellos sound, as well as the strings in general.

Mercury rarely recorded strings properly but here they sound tonally correct, neither nasally nor strident.

Side Two

A++, superb again. Watch out for the opening though — it’s full of compressor distortion. Once it passes, the sound is lovely: rich and sweet, two words we do not often associate with Mercury. But we do here.

The Absolute Sound Super Disc List

Inclusion on The TAS List doesn’t guarantee great sound, but Better Records does. If you don’t think a Hot Stamper pressing sounds as good as we’ve described, we’ll always happily take it back and refund your money. Good luck getting ol’ Harry to send you a check when the TAS-approved pressings you pick up don’t deliver. Ours are guaranteed to.

Side One

Suite No. 1
Suite No. 2

Side Two

Suite No. 2 (cont.)
Suite No. 3

Ancient Airs and Dances

Hungary, October 1956. Russian tanks roll into Budapest and brutally crush a 10-day-old uprising. Thousands of Hungarians flee their homeland to refugee camps in Austria. Amongst them are 200 musicians, most without their instruments, but determined to form an orchestra. With the help of refugee charities, private benefactors and the leadership of Antal Dorati, the Philharmonia Hungarica was born.

Within a year they are making world-class recordings, and performing all over the world. The Respighi Ancient Airs and Dances for Lute was recorded in 1958, and is still regarded as one of their finest works.

Ottorino RespighiThis is music of the modern era, but owes much to the past. Ottorino Respighi was not only a composer but also a musicologist and antiquarian. These 3 suites, written between 1917 and 1932, are arrangements of music from the Renaissance. The original composers flourished between 1575 and 1625. Their names Molinaro, Galilei, Caroso, Besard, Gianoncelli and Roncalli roll off the tongue beautifully, but are by no means household names today. Respighi’s task was to capture the elegance, subtlety and brilliance of this very old music in a form pleasing to the modern palate. He was so successful that they are some of the most popular works of the 20th Century.

Suites 1 and 2 are for full orchestra, and suite 3 is for strings only. Listening to them there is the curious juxtaposition of ancient ideas and themes with modern orchestration. To bring this off successfully, they must be performed with understated poise, elegance and the occassional flash of fire. The Philharmonia do this to perfection. From the well-known boisterous Bergemasca , to the soothing and elegant Campanae Parisienses (and incidentally a wonderful piece, a true discovery), the performances are polished and convincing. Nothing less could be expected under Dorati.

You may think that a recording over 40 years old may be left by the wayside by modern recording techniques. Not so. In fact, this is a CD that proves that a good analogue recording can be as good as any modern digital.

The common practice at the time was to use multiple microphones placed throughout the orchestra, then re-mix and balance them before final recording. Mercury’s sound engineer Bob Fine developed a new recording technique that used one ultra-sensitive microphone placed strategically in front of the orchestra. There was no limiting, balancing, mixing or boosting of the sound before it reached the final tape.

The result was a recording that was “like being in the living presence of the orchestra” according to Howard Taubman, chief music critic of the New York Times. This became known as Mercury’s Living Presence series of recordings. It was revolutionary in its time, and has proved itself so to this day.

Wonderful rediscovered music, a definative performance with a rich history, as good a recording as you will find anywhere, and for a bargain price. Worthy of its 5 stars.

good-music-guide.com review

Liszt / Piano Concertos – An Early Outlier

More of the music of Franz Liszt (1811-1880)

More Top Quality Classical Piano Recordings

This Beyond White Hot Stamper 2-pack has sound that must be experienced to be believed! The finest Liszt 1st & 2nd Concertos we know of for performance and unquestionably for sound when they sound like this. More like LIVE MUSIC than any classical recording I have played in longer than I care to remember – both sides are so big, rich and transparent we guarantee you have never heard a better piano concerto.

  • Our lengthy commentary entitled Outliers & Out-of-This-World Sound talks about how rare these kinds of pressings are and how to go about finding them.
  • We no longer give Four Pluses out as a matter of policy, but that doesn’t mean we don’t come across records that deserve them from time to time.

Richter and Kondrashin deliver the finest Liszt 1st & 2nd Piano Concertos I know of, musically, sonically and in every other way. Richter’s performance here is alternately energetic and lyrical, precisely as the work demands. The recording itself is explosively dynamic. The brass is unbelievably full, rich and powerful. You won’t find a better recording of this music anywhere, and on side two this pressing just cannot be beat. It’s BEYOND White Hot (A++++). There was simply no other copy on any side that was close to it. 

Both Sides Now

Big and rich (always a problem with piano recordings: you want to hear the percussive qualities of the instrument, but few copies can pull it off without sounding thin). We love the BIG, FAT, Tubey Magical sound of this recording! The piano is HUGE and powerful — like a real piano.

Huge hall, weight and energy, this is DEMO DISC QUALITY SOUND by any standard.

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